1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a copying apparatus with an automatic duplex copying function, an automatic composite copying function and a multiple copying function, wherein images can be formed on copying paper in a combined mode of manual paper feeding with the multiple copying function.
2. Description of Related Art
Copying machines which can perform automatic duplex copying operation and automatic composite copying operation are known.
In an automatic duplex copying mode and an automatic composite copying mode, after a first image is formed on one side of a sheet at an image transfer portion, the sheet is once stored in an intermediate tray without being ejected from the machine, and thereafter the sheet is fed to the image transfer portion again so that a second image can be formed on the other side of the sheet.
The size of a paper storing portion of said intermediate tray can be adapted to the size of paper to be stored therein. Paper to be fed from a feeding section such as feeding cassettes to the image transfer portion has various sizes such as B4, A4, B5, etc., so that the intermediate tray needs to meet each case.
Additionally, the data on the size of the paper, which is a necessity for determining the size of the paper storing portion of the intermediate tray, has been read out in a main control section with use of paper size indicators provided for the feeding cassettes.
Also, copying apparatuses each of which is equipped with a manual feeding unit have been provided. The manual feeding unit comprises a manual feeding port through which paper is fed to the image transfer portion manually. Even the paper which can not be stored in any of said cassettes because of its size (irregular size) can be fed with the manual feeding unit. Further, it goes without saying that the paper which can be stored in any of the cassettes can be fed with the manual feeding unit.
Also, copying apparatuses wherein a multiple copying mode can be designated have been known. The multiple copying mode is an operation mode in which the reproduction of one original document is repeated until a designated number of copies are made.
Further, copying apparatuses wherein the operation in the multiple copying mode can be performed toward paper fed through the manual feeding port (that is, copying apparatuses wherein images can be formed in a single manual feeding mode and a multiple manual feeding mode differently from each other) have been known.
With this type of copying apparatus, when a plurality of sheets whose sizes are the same are set in the manual feeding unit, and the multiple copying mode is designated with a specified key, the sheets are successively fed through the manual feeding port one by one, and the multiple copying operation is performed to form the image of an original document on the sheets being fed successively.
As mentioned above, the size of paper has been detected by the paper size indicators provided for the feeding cassettes. Accordingly, when paper is fed from the manual feeding unit, the paper size can not be detected, and the size of the paper storing portion of the intermediate tray can not be determined. For this reason, conventional copying apparatuses have been designed so that the duplex copying operation and the composite copying operation are inhibited when copying paper is fed from the manual feeding unit.